2025 Castle [wishlist/speculation]

[DonQuixote]

14 hours ago, ctx1769 said:

tLooking carefully at the above images of the castle in the background of the dragon. There is a shield above the gate and it 

Looks like it has 4 quarters in 2 different colours,  could this be a new faction or the return of an old one.

 

I've zoomed  right in to shield image and there appears to be something else on the shield so at a guess either the green dragon  or Red lion faction. 

I hope the horses are not brick built, otherwise it's going to cost  my wallet some notes.

It looks like the factions from the original joust set in 1979 yellow castle era 

[Mopasali]

14 hours ago, karrit said:

  I'd really like some in either of the Gray shades.

I think there was a leak on the Discord that they are brick-built.  I'm hoping they'll update the build from the 70s/80s brick-built horses as current pieces allow for beautiful MOCs of horses.  They recently recolored the horse head mold from a CMF for the Trevi Fountain, so we could get that too.  Even though I generally prefer brick-built animals, the exception is for molded horses probably out of nostalgia for the 90s sets.  

But a great benefit of brick-built is you can make your own colors!  And you can modify the build to get slightly different mounts like unicorns, reindeer, donkeys, etc.   There's a great MOC on Rebrickable for a mountable brick-built wolf for the CMF Barbarian, and we'd never get molded versions of all possible mounts from fantasy/legend.  There's a few brick-built bardings as well, and we'd never get prints for all factions.  So there are big benefits for us that top designers at Lego get creative with brick-built animals.  

[ctx1769]

I guess it's just a waiting game, till lego releases proper info. It's another one I'm looking forward to. 

[Mopasali]

17 hours ago, ctx1769 said:

I guess it's just a waiting game, till lego releases proper info. It's another one I'm looking forward to. 

Probably not.  In 2023 we got information on the August Creator wave in early May with official reveals in mid May.  Last year some August City sets had build features leak in April.

Unlike recent castle sets (Town Square, Lion Knights Castle, Blacksmith), I believe this wave of Creator (this horse knight castle, unicorn castle, and haunted house) is not a Lego exclusive for any time period, so information on the sets are circulated to a lot of stores in advance of the release date.  There are many possible sources of leaks.  Additionally, Europe gets some summer waves in June (while release dates in North America tend to be August).  Thus, leaks can come very early.  Promobricks has issued very early and accurate information on summer waves, probably thanks to the German toy store whose ads leak!  I wouldn't be surprised if at least the Knight Castle and the Haunted House get significant leaks in the next two months.

[BrickJagger]

19 hours ago, ctx1769 said:

I guess it's just a waiting game, till lego releases proper info. It's another one I'm looking forward to. 

I hate how long we need to wait these days, and really for no reason. They used to unveil all of the summer sets at the toy fairs in February! Now, we're not going to know what either of these looks like until days before they're on the shelves.

[ctx1769]

I totally forgot about promobricks, i used to go to their site alot. Thanks for reminding me about them.

[Westbrick]

The Alchemist’s Shop from Series 7 of the BDP got announced this evening and looks interesting. 

[zoth33]

4 minutes ago, Westbrick said:

The Alchemist’s Shop from Series 7 of the BDP got announced this evening and looks interesting. 

Yeah It was one of the sets I voted for.  I really hope the price is around $150 but we will see.  

[JohnTPT17]

7 minutes ago, zoth33 said:

Yeah It was one of the sets I voted for.  I really hope the price is around $150 but we will see.  

It's 2126 parts - I think closer to $200 is more likely. Lowest I see it going is $180. 

[Flyingkangaro]

24 minutes ago, Westbrick said:

The Alchemist’s Shop from Series 7 of the BDP got announced this evening and looks interesting. 

I was hoping for the other Alchemist. This one looks to close to the Medieval blacksmith set in my view.

I am not sure yet if I will spend the money on something that is similar to a set I already got but I will decide when the final designs are released.

[zoth33]

59 minutes ago, JohnTPT17 said:

It's 2126 parts - I think closer to $200 is more likely. Lowest I see it going is $180. 

Yeah plus they may make adjustments to the model and increase the piece count so yeah the price will probably be close to 200

[Triceron]

Since I already have 3 Blacksmiths, I'd prolly just buy the green tiles off PAB and make my own 'Alchemists shop'. All the decals are gonna be stickers anyways.

[MAB]

On 3/14/2025 at 10:11 PM, BrickJagger said:

I hate how long we need to wait these days, and really for no reason. They used to unveil all of the summer sets at the toy fairs in February! Now, we're not going to know what either of these looks like until days before they're on the shelves.

It is a different scenario these days. Long gone are the times when LEGO needed to persuade retailers to stock their sets. The popularity of LEGO and the number of direct sales through LEGO.com or LEGO stores means they don't have to use reveals at the various Toy Fairs to attract retailers to take their stock.

[GeoBrick]

7 hours ago, Triceron said:

Since I already have 3 Blacksmiths, I'd prolly just buy the green tiles off PAB and make my own 'Alchemists shop'. All the decals are gonna be stickers anyways.

You'll need alot more then just the green roof shields. Infact, only the light grey and olive green bricks of the workshop are also used in the Blacksmith. The staircase bricks are different (different technique as well), the walls of the middle floor -and roof floor are in tan instead of white, there's the half-rounded bricks (the support pillars) on both sides of the house,... the list goes on.

[Artanis I]

14 hours ago, MAB said:

It is a different scenario these days. Long gone are the times when LEGO needed to persuade retailers to stock their sets. The popularity of LEGO and the number of direct sales through LEGO.com or LEGO stores means they don't have to use reveals at the various Toy Fairs to attract retailers to take their stock.

The likelier deciding factor is that they need to keep their releases under wraps from their (bootleg/copycat) competitors for as long as possible.

[MAB]

9 hours ago, GeoBrick said:

You'll need alot more then just the green roof shields. Infact, only the light grey and olive green bricks of the workshop are also used in the Blacksmith. The staircase bricks are different (different technique as well), the walls of the middle floor -and roof floor are in tan instead of white, there's the half-rounded bricks (the support pillars) on both sides of the house,... the list goes on.

By "their own alchemist's shop" I assume they mean not reproducing the set from parts, but using the blacksmith building replacing the blue roof parts with green.

[GeoBrick]

2 hours ago, MAB said:

By "their own alchemist's shop" I assume they mean not reproducing the set from parts, but using the blacksmith building replacing the blue roof parts with green.

Ah, it must be that then.
One could as well pick all the different shades of blue roof parts from the three sets, and end up with a dark blue tiled roof, and a regular blue tiled roof. Saves the trouble of purchasing the green roof tiles.

[BrickJagger]

12 hours ago, Artanis I said:

The likelier deciding factor is that they need to keep their releases under wraps from their (bootleg/copycat) competitors for as long as possible.

They probably each played a role but I think that this was the primary reason for the change. I don't think it's a coincidence that Lego stopped going to the toy fairs at the same time they started heavily cracking down on leaks. To think that there was a time fairly recently that we would get summer set prelims in December!

I just don't like what it's done to the anticipation of waiting for a set to come out that you know will be good. These could both be stinkers, for all we know.

Edited March 21 by BrickJagger

[jefe]

What do we think are the chances whichever faction gets selected for the Prize Machine eventually gets put on PaB? There is precedent for Ideas torsos going on PaB, and they could have easily kept the LKC mf parts locked in that set but they didn’t. Seems likely BrickLink prices will be steep for the minifigs, given the rumored $90-100 price tag for the set

[Roebuck]

5 hours ago, jefe said:

What do we think are the chances whichever faction gets selected for the Prize Machine eventually gets put on PaB? There is precedent for Ideas torsos going on PaB, and they could have easily kept the LKC mf parts locked in that set but they didn’t. Seems likely BrickLink prices will be steep for the minifigs, given the rumored $90-100 price tag for the set

If they are not licensed I do not see why not I should be the next ideas set so hopefully not long to wait now (PAB on the other hand will take a while). Is there a sphere part in Lego that can fit a hole minifigure, it seems that those used in the set only fit half of one?

[iragm]

12 hours ago, jefe said:

What do we think are the chances whichever faction gets selected for the Prize Machine eventually gets put on PaB?

100%.  Were I cynical, I would say that including a castle minifigure in the prize machine was done primarily to get an additional army-builder friendly figure on PAB.  Once upon a time Lego claimed that PAB was done as a service, not as a profit maker.  But then they bought bricklink and now set prices for many parts based on the BL sale price and prices for many parts increased 10-20% over the last couple years.

 

It will take about 6 months after the prize machine releases to see the figures on PAB.

[Triceron]

On 3/21/2025 at 2:54 AM, GeoBrick said:

Ah, it must be that then.
One could as well pick all the different shades of blue roof parts from the three sets, and end up with a dark blue tiled roof, and a regular blue tiled roof. Saves the trouble of purchasing the green roof tiles.

True, though I think a green roof looks appropriate for an Alchemists shop.  Perhaps a color pairing with the sand green tiles could work too, if you'd want to save on tiles.

15 hours ago, jefe said:

What do we think are the chances whichever faction gets selected for the Prize Machine eventually gets put on PaB? There is precedent for Ideas torsos going on PaB

I'd just want the shields to appear on PAB, or better yet BAM for the best value bulk purchase.  I lucked out on a Tourney Knight torso, but I need the Raven shield to really complete him.

[ctx1769]

I have committed the Cardinal sin by getting weapons, shields and armour from Ali Express for army building. Even the minifigs and horses, yes its not Lego, but its cheap and sometimes the quality has a lot to be desired. I do buy Lego sets,

i am out of work so social money does not cover Lego any more. 

Edited March 26 by ctx1769

[GeoBrick]

Tar! Feathers! 

[Mopasali]

The Castle Discord is having a competition for MOCs of what the Medieval Horse Knight Castle could look like.  I'm excited to see rather moderate piece counts of castle builds!  Deadline is June 15th, so we could see leaks of the real set before this competition ends, but castle MOCs of less than 3000 pieces is always inspiring.